“Marina Barry creates Dorothea in a high energy, enthusiastic format..."

April 2020

It’s hard to know quite what to say. I’m grateful to be able to write this for one thing. Having the task of writing my monthly blog seems a wonderful luxury and privilege – hope I come up with something fitting.

One thing we all have now is extra time, some more than others, but again, lucky for me, as a writer having time is a gift that at times has been a rare commodity.

Even more than having time, having time feeling rested is amazing. I’ve stopped resisting restrictions and job endings, it’s so much easier to eke out some peace and ease that way, because I know this will end and we will take our lives up again.

So, how lucky was I to have had my reading of “I’ll Meet You in Darjeeling” which became “The Qualifiers” that now will be re-titled again? That happened March 7th with a full house of audience members and cast. I’ve read through all the comments and am awaiting the final Pow-Wow with Mike Lesser and my co-playwright Ryan Ramirez before going back to work. I’ve thought about starting because I do not want to lose this gift of time, but it’s churning around in my head, so I’m working in a quiet way.

Also reading more which is really helpful stylistically. While I’m only a playwright, reading novels does help me see possibilities and funnily enough vocal cadences. I love descriptions too, so that’s a fun luxury to wade in.

But boy do I miss tango and ballroom. I’ve got my ballet barre and have set regular work sessions between stretching, QiGong, a regular barre, thanks to Peff Modelski and Sarah Rector’s leg strengthening.

April 13th the Playground Experiment’s Volumes will be done in cyber space, and my short play “The Manicure” is on the docket. Never been read, never been read in cyber space, so hope I have an interesting report for next month.

That’s about it. Hope anyone reading this is well over the pandemic and has gone back to rehearsals and dance class.